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My little domestic child who loves to bake

Springville's winter wonderland

John's preschool is in a private home--a pretty log cabin style house

It snowed one day, then again the following day, which made for a beautiful effect on the trees

City of Springville

Today

Today Peter is leaving for two weeks.

Today my basement flooded. Again. I have honestly and truly lost track of how many times this is now. We dug it out, filled it in with rock, and covered the window well in September and thought we had the problem fixed. It is freezing and I have no idea how well it is going to dry out down there.

Today my dog pooped in his crate and left a holy mess when we let him out. The entire house smells like . . . well, you know. Sarah was wearing a dust mask this morning to walk around the house before school.

Today was my day to drive the kids to school and we got dumped on last night with snow. For some reason the city has stopped plowing our road this year. It must have something to do with budget cuts and our street's lucky number didn't come up.

Today I spent my last $15 on bagels and milk.

Today Peter said, "Well, at least this didn't happen tomorrow morning when I was gone. And at least the flooding wasn't as bad this time."

Am I expected to be optimistic today?
Because I'm not.

25 Random things about me

I wrote these 25 random things for my facebook and thought I'd post it on my blog for anyone who doesn't happen to do the facebook thing.

1. I secretly love Dr. Laura even though she brings me guilt every day
2. I have an English teacher that is terrible and I like to fantasize about busting out screaming what I know every one of us is thinking
3. Found my 1st gray hair last week--almost had a heart attack
4. I have no car keys to my Civic due to my son--so I can't drive it until we can afford to buy new ones (loving that microchip safety feature!!)
5 . I suck at babysitting
6. I would really love to graduate from college
7. I am not a creative writer--or even a creative thinker for that matter. I never think of story ideas out of the blue
8. When I read incredible literature I wish I could be a creative writer
9. I love animals and would have considered being a vet if I liked their owners
10. In the last 3 mo. I have gained 8 lbs. and I'm ticked at myself
11. My kids got their red hair from me--EVEN IF my hair doesn't look red to you (what color does it look anyway, by the way? I can never figure it out)
12. I am desperate for my kids to be veracious readers like me and so far I've only had 1 out of 3 (I'm not giving up)
13. I am in denial about how strongly opinionated I am
14. I love good food because I was deprived of it as a child
15. I am totally devoted to my husband because he is totally devoted to me (except when he makes me mad and I lose my mind in rage)
16. My favorite thing to do is to be with my family
17. I believe you should get your damn animal fixed instead of breeding it
18. I miss Amber's family (Peter's sister) every single day
19. I don't have a really close friend in Springville (see #18)
20. I think teenagers are great and as a mom like them much better than toddlers--will update feelings on this in 10 yrs.
21. I'm a tiny bit liberal and my husband is 1000% conservative
22. My husband and I can't do much talking about politics
23. Someday I'd like to travel farther out of the country than Tijuana
24. Because I am heavier than I'd like to be right now the most favorite part of my body is my *ahem* bosoms
25. I really do love living in Springville--so stop asking

I'd love to read 25 random facts about any of you--so post one on your blog now!!

A spiritual evening at the temple

The stake president has asked us to take pics of our kids in front of the Provo Temple to hang in their rooms. So, for FHE this week that is what we did. We left later than we should have and it was starting to get darkish.
When I say it was cold I am not kidding (and I don't care if you live in Alaska or whatever--it was cold enough to freeze my eyeballs.) The following day I saw on the news that Provo was 3 degrees that day --(probably right around the time we were there taking pictures.) I don't know if my hands have never been that cold.
I'm positive I was bordering on frostbite.

Peter is giving John "the eye" here instead of smiling--hee hee

Sarah was kinda sick already, and I don't think this helped a whole lot...

Nathaniel reminds me of the Charlie Brown caricatures here.

As if it wasn't already difficult enough, John is being a holy PITA here.
This was the best picture we got of Mr. Crank--even with the promise of his beloved "green" (mint&chip) ice cream afterwards.

Two or three BYU couples walked through the temple grounds while we were there (Martin Luther King Day--so temple closed) and were witnesses to our threats on John.
I told them they were looking into their future eternal family.
So enjoy your peace now--cause it ain't gonna last.
hee hee

Don't ya just love John? Wanna take him for a while?
No, really.
Please?
Dang.

John's current reign of terror

Grandpa and Uncle Greg

Last night we had the missionaries over for dinner. Being that we live in Utah this is the first time we have had them over since we moved here almost two years ago. So to celebrate the occasion we invited my Grandpa over to join us.
Whenever Grandpa comes it is a signal for John's to turn on his worst behavior switch. Of course, it isn't just when Grandpa comes, John reserves some of his best material for guests of all sorts. I suppose the missionaries were ammo for him as well.
Why is this? Very simple. We cannot beat him in front of other people.
OK. Not exactly. But you know what I mean.
To say that John is stubborn cannot be overstated. He is completely unbending. We choose our battles carefully and use The Nanny's "naughty chair" on a daily basis. Some days are better than others, but over Christmas John morphed into a new and more advanced state of "naughty."
At the dinner table last night he was sitting between a missionary and Grandpa. Somehow he always ends up next to grandpa. I don't know why I haven't been more strategic--some of us are just slower at catching on I guess. I turned just in time to see him poking Elder Ely in the face with a pen. Grandpa observed that he has never seen John eat his food. He merely sorts it, flings it, mixes it, and just makes an overall mess. I assured Grandpa that I had never really seen him eat a meal (that consisted of more than cheese) myself. Unless I starved him all day--which has proved motivational from time to time.
And when you have people over forget conversation. If John isn't banging on the piano for attention he is running laps around the guests. My aunt and uncle came for a little Christmas party and were the most fortunate witnesses to a punishment Peter and I reserve for John when he pees in his pants ( evidently because he is too lazy to take the ten steps to the bathroom). This is the cold shower method. It is quick, painless, and effective--and we enforce it very consistently. That's when aunt and uncle decided to make their exit.
For the record--really, he isn't this bad when we are alone. It is kind of like our dog Charlie. Stick around for a while and he'll calm down. Only John takes longer.
A lot longer.
Poor Grandpa. Peter and I did ponder one thing though--We bet Uncle Greg was at least as bad for Grandpa when he was a kid. As I recall Grandma once broke a wooden spoon over him. Occasionally his behavior would cause my mom to fear for her brother's life.
One of my personal favorites was Grandpa and Grandpa's method of keeping control over Christmas morning. Grandpa would tie the door of a room containing all the kids shut on Christmas Eve and then cut the rope in the morning to release the madly excited kids into the living room, where in a torrent of wrapping paper Christmas was over. Hilarious. I love it.
My parents even did it with us one Christmas.
Ahhh--the good ol' days . . .

Kind of a lot of snow here...

We've had a lot of snow here lately. Tuesday was my first day of school and it snowed all day. People on campus were falling left and right, and yours truly took a graceful fall as well. My calves still hurt from walking around on my tiptoes trying to avoid a fall. They kept shoveling and plowing but the snow just kept coming and it was perilous to even go out, let alone walk anywhere. I was 15 min. late to my first class.

Peter is trying to learn how to use the camera here, so this one is blurry. But you can see Nathaniel in the snow fort they built.

Charlie was having himself a good ol' time. Dogs love to run around in the snow--at least ours do. (This was a picture we wouldn't have been able to get with our other camera as he would have been moving too fast and it would have been totally blurry.)

Doesn't Sarah have the most fantastic color hair? I love it.

Unfortunately, she is a selfish girl and refuses to share any with her devoted mother.
Gosh, you completely put yourself out to give birth to them and kids don't even appreciate it nowadays...:)

New Years Eve

We had a blast on New Year's Eve with some old friends. Jeff was Peter's best friend in high school. He and his wife Nada invited us to their cabin in Bear Valley (Tehachapi) to spend New Years. We ate lots of good food and played several games. Our favorite is Quiddler--we play it all the time as a family. Sounds boring, but is really fun. Nada is from Prague where Jeff met her during his time in the Air Force. They have two absolutely beautiful girls and a giant Doberman (as seen trying to horn in on our picture).
Peter and I had never played Cranium before and we killed ourselves laughing as Nada and I tried to compete to get our respective husbands to guess the words "Chick Magnet" using only gestures, like charades. I'm clucking like a chicken and Nada was acting rather seductively twisting up her shirt...I swear we about died laughing.

Rebecca's baptism

Rebecca was baptized in Tehachapi, CA on December 27th. Peter's parents and all of his siblings were able to be there. It was a pretty great day.

My new camera

So Christmas rolled around here and April got something she didn't deserve...a Canon Revel XSi. I had been begging Peter for one for a while and gave up a couple of months ago knowing it was an awful large thing to ask for. So on Christmas Eve (he is still a man, after all) Peter mysteriously disappears getting what I can only assume is something practical for me. He was actually at Circuit City wheeling and dealing with the poor salesguy who was already there past closing time. He comes home and locks himself into the guest room only to emerge with presents for yours truly marked in the order to be opened.
Christmas morning I was shocked to say the least. The camera w lense, a camera bag and an additional long lense. I actually cried...well, I got teary at least.

I am so taking a photography class with this little baby, and hope you like pictures because my blog is gonna be filled with em' now(:

So bottom line, this is the present that counts towards my birthday this month, Mother's Day, 15th Anniversary, and very likely next Christmas too...and to think that all I asked him for was a tube of lipstick from Mary Kay to replace the last one I had for one day and the dog ate right out of my purse. Peter said that gifting makeup is like telling a woman to fix up her face.
Smart man, don't ya think?